Halo: The War
by SPARTAN-G117
Summary: The two survivors of Zuma squad joined the helljumpers and formed an elite sniper team giving them a reputation. Twenty-six years after their escape, in late 2552, they are dropped into Sydney, Australia to neutralize the brute chieftains leading the charge. (Zuma Sequel)
1. ODST

Three beeps sounded then my HEV dropped out the bottom of the UNSC Artemis, one of the ships orbiting Earth. The home fleet. My objective when we hit the ground was to find Dimitri Polanski and to find and neutralise Brute Chieftains leading their pack into battle.

We passed other UNSC ships fighting the covenant vessels outnumbering them ten to one. I watched as a CCS-class battlecruiser cut a UNSC frigate in half with its energy projector just before it was bisected by an orbital space station. The navy seemed to be winning for once.

Most of the pods launched were destined to land on the Covenant Supercarrier above New Mombasa but Dimitri and I were going to land in Sydney on the other side of the globe.

After five minutes of free fall the pods reverse thrusters engaged and slammed me into a rooftop near Sydney's centre.

I instantly popped open the pod, grabbed my SRS-99D rifle, shouldered it, upholstered my M7S SMG and opened coms to Dimitri.

"Zuma Bravo, this is Zuma Alpha, do you read me?"

"Yes, Lachlan I hear you."

"What is your position?"

"I'm on the road level of the bridge, comrade. Already fighting covies."

I looked off into the distance and saw the five century old bridge a couple of kilometres away.

"Wait there, Dimitri, I'll come to you."

I smashed open a door that led to a stair way and started running to the bottom floor. I encountered a squad of grunts about half way down and I filled them with the silenced SMG.

"How you holding Dimitri?"

"Not well. Just find somewhere to give cover from."

"Will do."

I reached one end of the bridge and saw plasma and needles flying somewhere in the middle. I looked to my left and saw one of the support towers.

"Perfect," I said to my self as I jogged towards it.

I opened an access door and started climbing another set of stairs up the tower. Eventually I reached the highest window which had a Jackal sniper sitting in it high above the ground. Rather than waste ammo on it I kicked it out and it plummeted down to the pavement below, screaming.

"Welcome to Earth you fucking bird," I said as I holstered the SMG and set up the sniper rifle, "Dimitri, I'm in a tower behind you. Paint me some targets."

Red outlines of brutes and grunts appeared on my HUD. I picked a shiny, golden brute who was leading the assault on the ODST from Reach. I positioned the blue circle of the sniper's scope on the ape's head and squeezed the trigger and sent a 14.5x114mm round flying through its skull killing it.

"Good shot comrade."

"One," I said kept count of how many brutes I killed, "Two, three, four."

I emptied my first magazine in half a minute all four bullets found their mark in an ape's head. With their leadership gone the accompanying grunts fled and were easily dispatched by Dimitri's BR55 rifle. I ran back down the tower and ran to Dimitri's position.

"Good shooting comrade."

"All in a days work."

"Only if the others were here to join us."

"Only if," I remembered how most of the Zuma squad cadets died during the covenant invasion of Circinius IV twenty six years before as I scratched four more tally marks onto the stock of the sniper.

"They are the reason we kept the name. Why we became the sniper-spotter team we are."

"C'mon, lets go see if we can find a chieftain."


	2. Hunters

I heard gunfire around a corner in the road, "Hold up. Sounds like someone's in trouble."

"They got hunters! Cover!" someone yelled with an Australian accent.

"C'mon, we got to help 'em, Dimitri." I said as I sprinted around into the battle ground.

"Axios!" We yelled in unison as we opened up charging into the battle.

"ODSTs? What the hell are ODST's doing here?" the same voice yelled as she noticed us and fuel rod exploded nearby.

We rushed into the battle gunning down the grunts and jackals accompanying the stronger units.

"Who cares, cover them," another replied before being vaporised by another green bolt of radiation.

"Dimitri, we need to kill those hunters," I said over coms.

"Already on it comrade," he replied as he threw a grenade at one of the monstrosity's feet as I done the same with the other.

The grenade went off and the hunter directed its fire towards me. A side stepped around it, spraying my SMG at its exposed mid section, as it fired a bolt. It passed over my shoulder and I felt the heat of the green bolt. It crashed towards me shield lowered. I let it charge me and again sidestepped it and unloaded the SMG's magazine into its mid section and it collapsed with a loud thud. I looked back and saw Dimitri standing over its partner's corpse squishing the surviving worms under his boot.

"I never thought I would see an ODST," the surviving Marine said as he walked down from a hill they were defending, "Bastards cornered us and started picking us off. Richie and I were the last ones. Too bad he copped one."

"Well it looks like we got here just in time then," I said as Dimitri and I depolarised our visors.

"Yeah," the Aussie replied, "What's the logo?"

"It's the Corbulo Academy of Military Science insignia, invaded by the covenant in 2526, five survivors. We decided to keep the patch to remember what happened there," Dimitri explained to the young Australian.

"And the squad name, Zuma," I said as I looked at one of the hunter's corpse.

"A lot of good people died that night."

"Sounds terrible, did anyone else make it?"

"Three others. Didn't know 'em personally," I replied.

"Out of how many?"

"I don't know two hundred-three hundred. Not to mention an entire battalion of Marines and ODSTs. You like askin' questions don't you."

"Well, I wanted to be a journalist before I joined the ADF," she pointed towards the white kangaroo painted on her shoulder.

"That explains it. You know where your unit is."

"Ah, they were at the bridge," she collected her thoughts, "but they pulled out to the opera house on the river."

"That's a decent hike, comrade. Know where we can get a ride."

"Don't know, might find a hog or something."

"Well, you would know this place better than we do. So lead the way."


	3. The ADF

We hiked down the river towards the centuries old opera house, dwarfed by the surrounding sky scrapers. As we approached we head gunfire in the nearby.

"That'll be them. C'mon," our Australian friend said as she heard the shots and started running.

"Sheila, wait!" I called, but there was no stopping the Aussie, "Shit, Dimitri, lets go."

We sprinted after her as a large explosion sounded.

"They must have a scorp, Lachlan."

"Or the covies have some heavy ordinance."

We caught up to Sheila who had dived behind cover and was spraying her MA5C.

"What took you guys so long? We got a fucking tank."

"Do they know we're here? Cause if they don't and they fire near us," I said annoyed.

"Ah, I forgot about that," she switched on her coms, "Koala one this is Koala seven, we are in your AO watch your fire, over."

I couldn't make out what the guy on the other end was saying but the Scorpion never fired in our general direction during the fight.

"Tell them to target the brutes first," I said to Sheila, "Then the smaller races."

She again took cover and spoke over her coms while a killed a couple of grunts firing on our position which were replaced with a trio of apes. I fired at them only for the rounds to bounce off their shields. I ducked and ejected the spent magazine off the side of the SMG and replaced it with a fresh one. The scorpion fired again as I rose from cover to fire at the brutes again only to be with dark red, almost black blood. Their leadership dead the remaining grunts went into chaos and we gunned them down within the minute.

"Clear!" I shouted.

"Clear!" Dimitri replied.

"ODSTs?" another Australian moved towards Dimitri and I then turned towards Sheila, "You said that it was just your squad."

"No, they're all KIA, Sir," she replied.

"Shit. We're not goin' well either, we only just got the tanks an hour ago and already we've lost two," I noticed the triple pips of a captain on his shoulder and a scorpion with its turret completely melted.

"Captain, we need some information," I said remembering our mission.

"And what would a couple of ODSTs doing in Sydney?"

"We're after a few chieftains."

"Well you're in luck. Come with me."

"Ellie, map please," the captain stood at ta table that lit up as the AI showed a holographic map of the city.

"Displaying map, captain."

"Ok, we are here," he waved his hand over a section of the map shortly before being highlighted blue, "We've had reports of heavy covenant activity here, here and here," these areas were highlighted red, "most of the ADF here is busy defending the orbital elevator, here, and Ellie's data centre, here."

"Hold up captain, something's descending from orbit. Something big," The AI was in alarm.

"How big?"

"That big," She displayed an image of a covenant CSO-class super carrier over the city covering the three red areas.

"They must've set up grave lifts there," Dimitri concluded.

"Shit, shit, shit," the captain cursed, "how the fuck are we going to bring down a super carrier."

As suddenly as it appeared it rose again into atmosphere disappearing.

"What is it doing?" I asked confused.

"Don't look at me," Ellie replied.

"Dimitri and I'll find out," I said as I put my helmet back on and polarised the visor.

"Ok, might be a good idea to stock up first. We don't have much but we could probably find something."


	4. The Drive

They didn't have any ammo for my M7S so I replaced it with an unsilenced MA5C. The Aussies didn't have any hogs to spare so they gave us a Mongoose ATV. I was driving with Dimitri holding onto the back of it. We were heading towards one of the covenant hot spots to see if we could figure out what was going on.

"I bet 50 credits that they just dropped off a shit ton of apes," Dimitri said over coms.

"Probably," I replied.

"Shit, gun it!" He yelled as plasma weaponry fired behind us.

I did so as a pair of ghosts gave pursuit and Dimitri fired his SAW in return.

"Keep going!"

"What the fuck do you think I'm doing!"

We passed over a cross walk which raised to form a road block halting the alien hover craft.

"Thanks Ellie," Dimitri said to a security camera as we passed by.

"Yeah, thanks."

We spoke too soon as a bright blue sphere dropped onto the road in front of us and exploded as we went over it, sending us in the air.

"Shit!" I yelled as I hit the ground.

"Lachlan, are you ok."

"I think so," I said as plasma and spikes hit the wall nearby as I pulled the assault rifle off my back and opened fire, "We need to get to the observation point. Where are you?"

"On the other side of a fucking brute pack."

"We don't have time for this, I'll see you there."

"Affirmative, Zuma Alpha. Zuma Bravo moving out."

I saw the ODST run while firing from the hip, plasma hitting the wall behind him. He was a lucky man. So was I. But one day that luck was gonna run out. And that day one of us would fall.


	5. The Chieftain

I made it to the apartment building overlooking the site where a gravity lift used to exist. There was a large circular platform in the middle of a park with a handful of wraith tanks and a lot of infantry units. Mostly brutes, including a chieftain.

"Zuma Alpha, Lachlan. I can't make it to the OP," Dimitri's voiced rang in my ears.

"Shit Dimitri."

"You got one?"

"Hell yeah I do," I replied as I put the reticule on a chieftain's head and then looked at the buildings opposite seeing purple dots scattered across the sky line, "Got some snipers too, and some wraiths."

"Have you told our Australian friends what they're doing?"

"Yeah, I've sent a video to the captain and Ellie."

"Ok, when you pull that trigger, they're gonna open up on you."

"I know. I'm ready," I repositioned the rifle on the chieftain, "I'm ready to join the rest of Zuma if it comes to it."

"No, no you're not. Humanity needs you, more than you think. You are one of the best shots the UNSC has seen, if you were any better, you'd be a Spartan."

"That's good to know," I squeezed the trigger sending the chambered 14.5x114mm round through the chieftain's right eye, "For Corbulo!"

Nearly instantly beams of light start firing on my position as I start picking them off.

"Axios!" I saw Dimitri run out into the park firing his SAW as I shifted my fire to the ground, "Lachlan, get the fuck out of here comrade!" he yelled as a wraith's mortar shot landed near him.

Realising what he was doing I got up and ran back the way I came, down the stairs, through the back door, through a horde of grunts. I heard the gunfire through Dimitri's coms. Full auto, mowing through grunts, jackals and brutes alike. Eventually I head him grunt in pain and collapse firing his sidearm until it clicked empty. After that I switched the coms off knowing I was the last member of Zuma squad.

I took a breather and scratched one more band onto the stock of my rifle and took a white marker out of my armour. I added another mark along with the seven others on the top of my scope along with his initials.

RJ, CI, RP, JR, NM, BW, LS, DP. The initials of Zuma. All but mine. I took of my helmet and sobbed at the loss of their lives, seven at Corbulo, one on Earth, one alive. One of nine.


End file.
